Methods and apparatus for monitoring and analyzing utility consumption

Abstract

Methods and apparatus for monitoring and analyzing utility consumption according to various aspects of the present technology generally comprise collecting and storing utility consumption information, processing utility consumption information, and outputting the processed utility consumption information. Utility consumption may be collected by one or more monitoring devices, and may comprise the use of one or more utilities and / or power sources, the use of energy sources used to power equipment, the generation of one or more utilities, energy, and / or power, a detected and / or measured environmental condition, and / or any other measurable quantity and / or detectable state relating to the environment the monitoring device is configured to operate in or observe. Processing and outputting utility consumption information may present utility consumption information in an easily-understandable and navigable manner.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCES TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61 / 805,805, filed Mar. 27, 2013, entitled METHODS AND APPARATUS FOR MONITORING UTILITY CONSUMPTION; claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61 / 805,820, filed Mar. 27, 2013, entitled METHODS AND APPARATUS FOR ANALYZING UTILITY CONSUMPTION; is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13 / 916,513, filed on Jun. 12, 2013, entitled SYSTEM AND METHODS FOR REAL-TIME DETECTION, CORRECTION, AND TRANSFORMATION OF TIME SERIES DATA; which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61 / 658,873, filed Jun. 12, 2012, entitled SYSTEM AND METHODS FOR REAL TIME HEURISTIC ERROR CORRECTION AND PROJECTION MODELING OF ENERGY TIME SERIES DATA; and incorporates the disclosure of each application by reference. To the extent that the present disclosure conflicts with any referenced application, however, the present disclosure is ...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The present technology can help increase energy efficiency, reduce energy costs, and improve facility situational awareness based on relevant environmental factors. It can also allow comprehensive analysis of energy and resource usage information for all facility types. Furthermore, it can provide a broader set of historical usage data and near-real-time access to energy usage across an entire organization. This allows facilities managers to proactively save energy and reduce energy costs.

Problems solved by technology

However, current building energy management systems are either overly decoupled from the building automation systems or are heavily dependent upon the deployment and configuration of building automation systems.

Further, current building energy management systems do not provide an in-depth or robust analysis of historical and current energy and resource usage.

These shortcomings cause the building energy management systems to operate in their individual data island, require greater upfront commissioning costs due to their broad deployment requirements, and impede effective ongoing systems diagnostics and maintenance scheduling.

As a result, building energy management systems are difficult to deploy and / or are lacking in their ability to effectively reduce energy usage and costs.

Images